by Stevens, GJ
“Are you feeling all right?” he said, but before I could snap my teeth forward he stepped back without a pause, withdrawing from the light and leaving me with just an empty pit in my stomach.
I could hear his movement, swifter than I could have imagined and he was around the other side of the bed, swiping the lamp off, plunging the room in complete darkness.
This was it. This was the time. The event to change the way I saw the world was about to happen, one way or another.
Instead of him coming near I listened as he ran from the room. He must have heard something before me, some pre-warning I hadn’t caught.
Only now could I hear the glass shattering to the floor somewhere downstairs.
51
Toni. It had to be her.
She was here to save the day, to take care of me.
The freak couldn’t hide his motion down the stairs. She would hear him coming long before she would see the massive target lumbering forward with the Taser. She would shoot him down before he had any chance to react.
I screamed, louder and longer than I thought I could. The gunshot came sooner than I could have hoped, the second soon after, quickly followed by the third, leaving only silence after the echo died.
I listened hard. I listened long and let myself relax, taking deep breaths though my nose. The last of his fresh scent had gone, leaving only the odour I tried to ignore.
Was there another mixed in with the musk?
Could I smell Toni?
The memory of how she would taste sat in the forefront of my mind. The scent to which all others fall short.
No, I couldn’t make her out. I couldn’t find her, my palette blank.
Then it came. Not the smell, but the noise. I heard the hum, the motion of the masses beyond the walls. They’d followed the sound and sought the cause of the loud noise, but they would stay to get at what created the glorious smell. I heard movement in the house too, controlled, not frantic; the scrape of heavy furniture.
At first I pictured Toni hauling heavy cabinets across the room, moving solid wood to block the door she’d just smashed open. But why wasn’t she racing to find me? Why couldn’t I taste her on my lips?
The hunger was great enough, the chasm in my belly bottomless, my need singing out for her. Maybe it wasn’t Toni after all and the nightmare was about to start over, but this time worse when they saw me bound and helpless on the bed.
With a smirk, I pitied whoever else would come into the room, picturing me tearing their face off as they came near.
I tested the bounds at my arms, pulling hard against the strain. I tried to judge if I let go, if I let the beast inside grow at its will, could I pull free? Would I be submitting myself to the creature I wouldn’t be able to turn off when I needed?
No, I told myself. I must fight on and concentrated back on the noise. I could hear definite footsteps coming from the hallway. The steps were so light compared to what had come before.
So calm.
I caught the first scent, the glorious smell so intoxicating. It was Toni standing there in the doorway; hers was the slender figure I could just make out in the last ebbs of the light through the windows. But why was she at the end of the bed not saying a word?
“Toni,” I said without question, but she didn’t respond. “Toni. Let me out please.”
The figure moved with a grace only confirming what I knew, but with an unhurried pace I couldn’t understand. Why wasn’t she rushing to free me?
Instead, as she grew near, I felt her fingers on my ankle, tracing with a light touch against my skin, the electricity stronger than the Taser’s punch. My nerves were on fire as her taste sparked the inside of my nose, energy coursing between my legs.
I raised my hips up and down as she travelled with her fingers as a guide, getting closer to where I was desperate for her touch.
She raised her hand as she was about to arrive, my body aching, hips bucking to find her touch again, but she'd gone and I couldn’t make out her form; only knowing she was there in the shadow, her smell almost solid in my mouth.
The light burst on and I squeezed my eyes closed. The lamp moved toward the ceiling and I opened my eyes to see Toni looking me up and down, a playful grin on her face.
“Let me out,” I said with a stranger’s low tone.
She shook her head, the smile gone in an instant.
“I think you better stay there for a while longer,” she said, but when she didn’t raise her eyebrows, didn’t give a childish giggle, my face screwed up and I shook my head.
I didn’t want her to take away my senses on fire, to take what I had. What I could feel.
I bucked and I pleaded as her fist came down to my thigh, the syringe of the red liquid curled in her fingers as I snapped my teeth towards her hand.
52
Surrounded by a sea of creatures of the night, the starless dark sky all around me, I stood on a stone column rising high above, in a white shimmering lace nightgown, watching as they clawed at the air. With their disfigured, rotten faces melting to the floor, I had no emotion, didn’t fear, didn’t want for anything; the hunger in my belly satisfied.
As I watched, my head turned down without my will and I saw my once-pristine white gown dripped with blood, congealing as it rolled down my front. My fingers came away from my face wet and sticky. The pads of each were red as I looked, the scarlet darkening, cracking as it dried before my eyes.
My focus fell to the floor far below. The creatures had parted, were spreading wide, each running away from the naked body lying at the base of the pillar. My vision zoomed and as it did, I saw the creatures had changed, screams raising from their voices. They were human now. Real. Alive, and running for fear of the body surrounded in a spot of light. I couldn’t look up to see its source.
Dumbfounded and unable to find breath, I could only stare down. I couldn’t look away as I saw a woman on her back, naked, her white pale skin perfect in every way; her mound of hair trimmed to a line, her breasts the perfect size. Not too big or too small. Her arms spread, hands upturned at her side.
I knew it was Toni, despite not being able to see her face; the skin missing, leaving just the sculpt of her bones and a ragged mass of flesh.
It was Toni, her scent undeniable. Thick, strong, shivers ran down my spine as I stood there on the pillar, now less than a foot high, the darkness empty of all but her slain body.
I wanted to stare on. I wanted to take her in, but something drove me forward, my hands stuck behind my back and I felt as if pushed from the plinth. I screamed with anger, with pain, tears rolling from my eyes as I opened my mouth. With no breath, I panted for words as I lunged, my face forced to her fleshy stomach as she called out my name.
“Jess,” she said, and I opened my eyes to the darkness.
I lay on my side with my hands bound around my back.
“Jess,” she repeated.
I blinked to take in more light.
My legs were free, my feet bare, but I was still on the bed as the shadowy shape of the room came into focus.
“Jess,” she said one more time.
I nodded, afraid I would have no voice.
“They’re here,” she said.
“Where?” I replied, surprised at my voice. “Who?” I added as I processed. “My hands?”
“How you feeling?”
I sat up, my abs aching as I pulled up to sit. I remembered laying on the bed. Remembered my wrists bound.
“Hungry,” I said, realising they were the wrong words as the shadow I could only just make out stepped back and pushed out something square in her hands.
“Eggs, bacon, that kind of thing,” I said, not knowing how else to express myself.
I watched as she relaxed and drew in close. Her scent had gone, the powerful elixir only a dreamlike memory.
“Good,” she replied. “It only took half the time.” I could hear the warmth in her voice. “That’s good. It means it's having an effect.”
&nbs
p; “What time is it?”
“One,” she replied.
“Can we have more light?”
“Power’s out.”
“My hands,” I said, shaking my wrists to make sure it hadn’t been part of the dream.
“Soon,” Toni replied. “I had to be sure.”
I nodded in the darkness.
“Who’s here?” I said, remembering her words. For the first time I could sense someone else close.
“I am,” came a woman’s voice, pulling at a memory, sending the blood from my face as I twisted around to the doorway.
“Toni,” I replied. “What’s your mother doing here?”
A rumble of laughter came from the woman’s throat and I struggled to turn my legs, shuffling to the side of the bed.
Bright torch lights beamed at me from the doorway as my feet found the floor after too long. The lights were moving and figures were around me.
A hand gave a firm grip around the cuffs, pushing my arms up my back, forcing me forward as I stood. Pushing me towards the door.
“Toni?” I said, pleading.
“Come quietly.” Toni’s voice breathed low from somewhere in the room. “I told you we had to find her.”
“And here I am,” said the woman, her smile obvious.
53
“Not like this,” I said, the chasm in my stomach growing.
“It’s okay,” Toni replied to the background of low laughter coming from beside the doorway. “You’re not helping,” she said, but in a different direction.
The laughter slowed.
“Not like this,” I repeated with my voice low. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I replied, twisting my body and testing the grip on the cuffs.
“You were dead to the world,” Toni replied. “I got a call.”
“You didn’t have a phone,” I said, failing to keep the emotion from my voice. I waited for the reply, but it didn’t come. “You could have waited, discussed it. Like adults do.”
There was no reply other than a snort from the doorway.
“Please,” Toni pleaded.
“Why am I so shocked you’ve let me down again?” I said out loud, shaking my hands, but the bounds held firm.
“Jess, don’t do this.”
“No. You don’t do this, Toni,” I said, letting my anger build. “You told me they’d pull me apart. They’d want to find out why your medicine was working when the others hadn’t.”
“I promise you’ll be okay. We’ll look after you. I’ll make sure you'll be fine.”
“They win again. You chose them over me.”
“Jess, please.”
“But it’s what you do, right? It’s what you have to do. You always fuck us up.”
A huff of air came from the doorway.
“Please, ladies, stop with this sickly crap. We need to hustle. We’ve got the fate of humanity in our hands and I haven’t got time to listen to this disgusting, deviant talk. I’ve told you she’s just a phase, Antonia. You’ll get over it. We’ll find you a nice man and you’ll never look back. Trust me.”
“Are you going to let her talk to us like this?” I snapped, trying my best to shake my hands from the hold.
“Stay out of it, Mother. It’s not a phase,” Toni shouted, her words caustic, but then I heard her voice turn in my direction. “Jess and I are meant for each other.”
The words sounded more like an accusation than a declaration.
“My hands, Toni? We’ve obviously got lots to discuss,” I said, trying to let the whine out from my words as I looked in the general direction of where her voice had come from. The lights still dazzled bright in my eyes.
“We’ll have plenty of time to talk,” she said, but before I could question her meaning there was a gruff call from below; a man’s urgent shout for everyone to get moving. Something was coming and it didn’t take much to know what.
The lights from the doorway disappeared down the stairs and I pushed back against my braced arms, wincing as my wrists pushed upwards and forced my shoulders down.
“Really,” I said through the pain.
Toni’s voice came more distant this time.
“I said not to hurt her,” she said, her voice more than a little childlike.
I couldn’t tell, but the mother must have given a wave or some other signal to let the pressure on my arms relax enough for me to stand up tall. I tried to twist, but the hand on the cuffs and my shoulder held me firm.
“So you don’t need me to film this shit now?” I shouted as I fought against the hold. “No more bargaining required, or have you already struck a deal? What have you sold to the Devil, Toni?”
A low rumble of laughter came from close by. Her mother had neared.
“What are you doing, Toni?” I said as my voice settled back. “How can you trust this woman after what she did to you?”
Toni’s voice came back weak, but her mother’s voice cut over it before I could hear.
“What I did?” the mother said. “Get her to the truck. Stop pussyfooting around. We need to find out what happens if she survives. We need to see if what you’re saying is right.”
It felt like my insides had drained out. I could hear Toni protesting as she moved around the room; each time I thought I heard her speak, her mother cut in.
“It was your idea,” the mother said.
The words cut through me and I felt as if I was about to pass out. My brain numbed; the only hope left was that I was still in a drug-addled dream.
“What?” I said. I wanted to say more, but I had no energy.
“It’s okay. It’s not like it sounds,” Toni said, finally given a chance to speak. “We’ll get through this and we can be together again. We’ll have the rest of our lives, don’t worry.”
The questions came thick and fast in my head.
What had she done? How involved was she? Had she set this all up? Was she the reason they had infected me? Was this all just to get me close, to be together, or was it some kind of revenge for leaving her?
Another shout came from downstairs, but with more urgency this time. The figure at my back tried to push me along.
Another call came. We’d missed the opportunity. The air thickened with curses rising from the stairwell.
Whoever held my arms pulled me back into the room as I watched shadows from the beams of light downstairs scattering, hurrying as they danced on the walls before disappearing. I heard the front door slam and a call went up from outside.
I didn’t flinch at the gunfire. Instead, I turned around to the window and saw two figures standing on either side, their silhouettes hardly visible until the guy at my back glanced their way, his head torch following.
Toni was to the right; that woman, her mother, to the left. Both had the side of the curtain lifted, their faces hidden as they peered out. The guy flinched away when he realised what he’d done and the light was back on me, but it was too late.
Energy flooded back through my veins. I don’t know if it was a side effect of the drug, but I could feel an animalistic anger raging inside me. And now I’d seen it was just the four of us in the room.
To the orchestra of gunfire raining lead outside, I dropped to the floor and, rather than being dragged down, he let me fall. Before his breath had huffed out in annoyance and he’d completed his bend to pull me back, I’d twisted around and had my knee in his face.
With our short scuffle blocked from the ear by the explosions lighting up the night outside, I felt bone crack. My knee jolted forward as his cartilage displaced and the nose gave way.
He gave no reply. He was out cold, slumped to the floor.
I paused, watching the line of light from his head torch along the stained carpet.
I saw my chance, my first instinct to run abandoned. Instead, I twisted, squatting backward to the carpet. The pistol came out of the holster much easier than I’d expected.
Ignoring the pain in my wrists as they scraped against the cuffs, I pulled the slide back and hop
ed it was a Glock. I had no chance to feel for a safety.
Standing tall, I angled my body sideways, my shoulders aching as I twisted my arms behind my back to get the gun pointed toward the window and I swapped between the pair’s shadowy positions.
I kicked the head lamp, glancing the guy’s head. He didn’t complain as the torch spun for a moment. It came to rest facing me, obscuring the tiny amount of light coming from the window.
It was then they first noticed. A shadow turned; Toni first, but the other followed her sharp breath. Despite the chorus of the fight outside, I could tell they were looking my way.
Toni had moved in the last few moments, her voice coming different to how I expected, their shadows now one. I retrained the gun away from her voice.
“What are you going to do with that?” Toni said, her voice calm, somehow heard over the slowing rate of fire from outside.
I looked down past the light. The guy who’d held me had woken and was crawling away towards the window.
“I thought I could trust you. I thought I needed you,” I said, pulling in a deep breath, not thinking before I spoke.
“You do need me and I need you. This is for your own good,” she replied, her voice moving closer. Her mother gave a push of air from her lungs in disgust, tutting between the slowing shots from outside. I was sure her sound came from the left.
“Did you do this to me?” I said. All I could hear was Toni’s feet stepping toward me and the mother’s garbled voice in the background. “Did you bring me here for this?”
When she gave no reply other than the movement forward, I closed my eyes and let the gun drift to the left, centring the sight on her mother’s shadow, in my mind’s eye at least, and pulled the trigger three times.
54
Running down the stairs with tears streaming down my face, my shoulder slid across the wallpaper to keep me steady as I raced to the ground floor. Not able to slow without toppling, no arms to balance, all my hands could do was grip the gun. My upper arm took the force as I slammed hard into the thin toilet door, the hardboard cracking down the middle as it stopped my fall.